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After the Seahawks beat the Redskins 24-14 in their NFC Wild Card playoff game Sunday, the players — as always — got together at midfield to congratulate each other. Pay their respects. Or at least a little good-natured smack-talk.

Redskins' OT Trent Williams is congratulated by fans after his team beat the Cowboys on Dec. 30 to secure a trip to the playoffs. (Richard Lipski/AP Photo)

Not Washington offensive tackle Trent Williams. As the players and media swarmed FedEX Field after the clock hit zero, Williams and Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman got in each other’s faces. After exchanging a few words, Williams swatted Sherman in the face and walked away.

“He came up and tapped me, ‘What’s up now? I’ll swing on you’,” Sherman said.

…”Swing!” Sherman said he told Williams in a daring tone. “He told me was going to swing, and he swung. That’s what he did, and that’s that. He thought I was going to be scared. I’m not scared.”

Most likely, it wasn’t unprovoked — Sherman has been known for trash-talking throughout the season. He yelled at quarterback Tom Brady — “You mad, bro?” — after the Seahawks beat the Patriots earlier in the season, and continued to be vocal as he faced a four-game suspension for a failed drug test, which Sherman successfully appealed in December.

The slap was perhaps less of an open-palm slap than it was a smash to the face. Nevertheless, it caught Sherman off-guard. As Williams walked back to his sideline, Sherman waived at him with a big grin on his face.

“I mean, just high emotions, man. I let them get the best of me. It’s nobody’s fault but mine,” Williams said. “I’ve got to calm down a little bit. It’s just when you lose a game like this with high intensity, you’re a little on edge, and I reacted in an immature manner. I’m taught better than that. I’ve just got to be better. It’s my first playoff run, to have the season end like that, and to kind of be taunted, it’d take a bigger man to walk away, and next time I just got to be a bigger man.”

Given that Williams is 6 feet 5 inches tall and tips the scales at 325 pounds, we can declare him the bigger man.

Sherman later said that Williams apologized.

Received a very classy text from @trentw71. Great player! This is an emotional game no ill will (cont) tl.gd/kkm6gh